A platform for research: civil engineering, architecture and urbanism
A platform for research: civil engineering, architecture and urbanism
Mechanisms enabling specific plant-ant mutualisms: Acacia-Pseudomyrmex as a model system ; Mechanismen, die Pflanzen-Ameisen Interaktionen, ermöglichen: Acacia-Pseudomyrmex als Modellsystem
Mutualisms are interactions among different species that lead to net fitness benefits for all partners involved. In plant-ant mutualisms, plants provide to ants an array of rewards, such as extrafloral nectar (EFN), food bodies, or nesting space. Ants are attracted, or completely nourished, by plant-derived food rewards and serve as a means of indirect defence of plants against herbivores. Although these mutualisms can become very specific, the rewards traded among mutualist partners may also be attractive for non-mutualist organisms, i.e., exploiters that make use of the host-derived rewards without reciprocating. Thus, the goal of this study was to investigate mechanisms that drive the specificity of plant-ant interactions, and that stabilize it from exploitation. The mutualism of Acacia plants with Pseudomyrmex ants was used as a model system, in which we can find different kinds of plant-ant interactions that vary in their specificity: facultative and obligate. Whereas Acacia obligate plants (myrmecophytes) secrete EFN at high quantities and constituvely, to house and nourish symbiotic ants of P. ferrugineus, facultative ones (non-myrmecophytes) secrete it only in response to damage, attracting generalist ants. These differences in plant-ant interactions make this genus Acacia highly suitable to study mechanisms that may determine species-specific interaction. Specifically, I focused my study on the chemistry of EFN (amino acids and proteins) and on the ant behaviour in terms of defence against nectar robbers, herbivores and leaf pathogens. Amino acid composition of obligate Acacia was highly specialized and adapted to the preferences and nutritive requirements of the specialised mutualist ant P. ferrugineus. Mutualist ants preferred EFN solutions that contained exactly those amino acids that were quantitatively dominating in myrmecophyte EFN. By contrast, generalist ants preferred sugar solutions with amino acids over mere sugar solutions but were not able to discriminate among different numbers or ...
Mechanisms enabling specific plant-ant mutualisms: Acacia-Pseudomyrmex as a model system ; Mechanismen, die Pflanzen-Ameisen Interaktionen, ermöglichen: Acacia-Pseudomyrmex als Modellsystem
Mutualisms are interactions among different species that lead to net fitness benefits for all partners involved. In plant-ant mutualisms, plants provide to ants an array of rewards, such as extrafloral nectar (EFN), food bodies, or nesting space. Ants are attracted, or completely nourished, by plant-derived food rewards and serve as a means of indirect defence of plants against herbivores. Although these mutualisms can become very specific, the rewards traded among mutualist partners may also be attractive for non-mutualist organisms, i.e., exploiters that make use of the host-derived rewards without reciprocating. Thus, the goal of this study was to investigate mechanisms that drive the specificity of plant-ant interactions, and that stabilize it from exploitation. The mutualism of Acacia plants with Pseudomyrmex ants was used as a model system, in which we can find different kinds of plant-ant interactions that vary in their specificity: facultative and obligate. Whereas Acacia obligate plants (myrmecophytes) secrete EFN at high quantities and constituvely, to house and nourish symbiotic ants of P. ferrugineus, facultative ones (non-myrmecophytes) secrete it only in response to damage, attracting generalist ants. These differences in plant-ant interactions make this genus Acacia highly suitable to study mechanisms that may determine species-specific interaction. Specifically, I focused my study on the chemistry of EFN (amino acids and proteins) and on the ant behaviour in terms of defence against nectar robbers, herbivores and leaf pathogens. Amino acid composition of obligate Acacia was highly specialized and adapted to the preferences and nutritive requirements of the specialised mutualist ant P. ferrugineus. Mutualist ants preferred EFN solutions that contained exactly those amino acids that were quantitatively dominating in myrmecophyte EFN. By contrast, generalist ants preferred sugar solutions with amino acids over mere sugar solutions but were not able to discriminate among different numbers or ...
Mechanisms enabling specific plant-ant mutualisms: Acacia-Pseudomyrmex as a model system ; Mechanismen, die Pflanzen-Ameisen Interaktionen, ermöglichen: Acacia-Pseudomyrmex als Modellsystem
Gonzalez-Teuber, Marcia (author) / Heil, Martin
2010-04-23
Theses
Electronic Resource
English
Online Contents | 1996
Cestocidal activity of Acacia auriculiformis
| British Library Online Contents | 1996
| Springer Verlag | 2017